I respect Mirtle, but when I read the memo it looks like it said the GMs may NOT discuss the ongoing CBA negotiations with the players and any discussion should be relayed to the NHLPA. Not sure if there is more to read into this.

More than anything else what the lockout has shown me is that the NHL is covered by a bunch of clowns.

Can any of these guys write a thoughtful, insightful piece that isn’t completely biased, full of Hockeybuzz-level sourcing, and baldly dismissive of actual events?

I mean, I like Mirtle… but that piece of his is pig swill. Is he quoting somebody on the record? Is he documenting how what the NHL did is an ‘end-around’? Is he connecting any of his claims with anything, anything at all?

Well, you can read into the fact that they gave permission to the GMs to even talk to the players. I don’t see why people gloss over that fact when they say the memo looked like it was telling them to not talk about the CBA. Sure, that is what the memo talks about most, but there is no need for the memo at all if they hadn’t allowed the GMs to talk to players for a couple days in the first place.